Breakout

by Elise Faber

  He snorted. “Well, beer was involved.”

  A pat of his hand. “I’m glad you had that day.” Her eyes told him she understood, that she wasn’t hurt for not having been included in the outing. The Island had been his place with his dad, and he had stopped by her house before his time was up. “What were some of the other things the boys did?”

  He grasped on to the change in topic and dished on a few of the other guys’ adventures with the Cup, all of which were pretty tame when taking into account some of the things players of the past had done.

  “No bonfires?” his mom asked with a smile.

  “Not this time around.”

  “Probably for the best,” she said. “I’m assuming the Cup’s handlers frown on that sort of thing.”

  He took a swig of his beer. “You would be assuming right.” A comfortable silence fell as their server approached, depositing their food in front of them. “How long are you in town?” he asked after their waitress had left.

  His mom stilled, swallowing her bite of sandwich in a way that looked decidedly painful, but when she kept her eyes on her plate instead of looking up at him, Kevin’s stomach twisted itself into knots.

  Fuck.

  “Mom—” He broke off. Was she sick? Was it bad? Shit. He didn’t think he could handle losing another parent that way.

  Warm fingers on his. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I didn’t realize what you might think. I’m fine.”

  His pulse slowed. “Are you sure?”

  A nod. “I saw my doctor for my annual physical just before . . .”

  That pause nearly killed him.

  “Before what, Mom?”

  She cleared her throat. “Just before I moved out here.”

  Kevin froze, relief pouring through him, and that loosened his tongue. “What the fuck, Mom? I thought you were dying, for God’s sake.” He shook his head. “How many times have I told you to come?”

  “Watch your tongue, Kev,” she said in a tone that was the reason he still let her fix his hair. Then she added, the words tinged with an acute pain that he knew all too well. “I wasn’t ready before.”

  He turned his hand over, laced their fingers together. “I know.”

  His mother squeezed his hand, pulled back, and then blinked furiously before picking up her sandwich and taking another bite.

  He copied her action, though the sub from one of his favorite places in the city suddenly tasted like ash. But as it often went with grief—or at least with his grief—the breath-stealing, sharp agony of remembrance only lasted a short while. Then it began fading, the pain easing, the tightness in his throat relaxing, even his taste buds returning to attention. After a few minutes, he could taste his sandwich again, could breathe normally, could focus on the woman in front of him.

  “You need help selling the house, finding a place to stay?” he asked. “My spare room is ready and available until you do.”

  Her lips curved. “Always looking out for me, baby.”

  “You’re my mom.” She was his only family, the most important woman in his life, and he’d promised his dad he would never stop taking care of her.

  “But no,” she said. “I’ve already sold the house. It closed last week.” She glanced down at her phone. “Whatever stuff I didn’t donate or sell is on a truck and will be delivered to my apartment next Tuesday.”

  Kevin wasn’t gonna lie. He stared at his mother for a good two minutes, shock having stolen his words. “Apartment?”

  She smiled, and it was a gut-punch in the best way. He hadn’t seen that smile in years. In fucking years. “It’s amazing,” she said, unlocking her phone and pulling up a dozen pictures. “It’s in the cutest part of town and . . . get this! It’s above a bookstore. Honestly, it couldn’t be more perfect!”

  His throat got tight again.

  “And down the road is a farmer’s market every Thursday and Sunday. Then there’s the cutest little coffee shop a few doors down. It has the best lemon pound cake I’ve ever tasted in my life and—” He listened to her expound on the restaurants nearby, the park where she’d had a chance to pet not one but two pugs, and the floor-to-ceiling windows in her bedroom that gave her the perfect view of that park and even a sliver of the bay beyond. “—the best part is that it’s close to you.”

  He pushed up from his chair, moved around the table, and plunked down into the booth next to her, sliding an arm over her shoulders. Uncertainty was back in her eyes.

  “It sounds perfect, Mom.”

  She relaxed.

  “But you should have told me you were moving.” He glared when she rolled her eyes. “You shouldn’t have had to sort the house and move on your own.”

  Her shrug threatened to dislodge his arm. “I’ve been on my own for ten years now, bub. I’m used to it.”

  “You don’t have to be.” He dropped his arm when she shrugged again, knowing he was heavy and she was small, but he didn’t move away. Instead, he nudged her shoulder with his and said, “Even if you are stubborn enough to be used to it.”

  She sighed. “I needed to do it on my own.”

  That he understood. “Okay, Mom, but you’re staying at my place until your furniture comes.”

  A grin. “Why do you think you’re buying me lunch?” He laughed as she shoved him out of the booth and gestured to his chair. “Now, get out of my booth, plunk your butt in that seat and finish your sandwich. I’ll fix your favorite for dinner.”

  Knowing that meant biscuits along with chicken and dumplings, a meal that was decidedly off nutritionist-Rebecca’s plan, but also one that he hadn’t had in over a year, meant that Kevin hustled his ass into his chair and dove into his sandwich.

  Three

  Rebecca

  She stared down the intern in front of her. The intern who’d just presented her with an extremely subpar representation of what she’d asked for.

  “In what universe do you think this is acceptable?” she asked quietly, flipping the folder closed and reclining back in her desk chair.

  The little man-child spread his legs, reclining back into his own far more uncomfortable wooden chair, and adopted the persona of a horribly wronged individual by crossing his arms and releasing a long-suffering sigh. “You didn’t give me enough time.”

  Rebecca slipped her feet back into her heels, stood, and picked up the folder. “You want to rethink that excuse?”

  A huff was her only response.

  “So, I didn’t see you at Trent’s last night? Downing beer way past midnight with a group of fellow frat boys instead of completing the project I asked you for?” She shoved the folder back at him, smirking when he struggled to catch it before it hit the floor and stand at the same time.

  His brows drew together. “Where do you get off spying on me?”

  She lifted one red-painted fingernail. “First, I happen to like to get a drink after work every once in a while. Second, when that drink is with one Devon Scott”—her former boss and owner of the premier sports management group in the nation—“and I know my intern would like to make the leap to that field, I pay the fuck attention. And so does Devon. So, when my intern is making a fucking nuisance of himself at the bar, coming on too strong with the waitresses, arguing about paying the tab he racked up at the end of the night, tipping over chairs in a drunken stupor, and well, just being your own special brand of asshole, I pay even more attention.” She paused, took in his pale face, dropped her tone conspiratorially. “And then, when my intern doesn’t turn in the work I asked for in a quality I expect . . . that means I hand him his final check and advise him to get his shit together so he doesn’t find every door in this industry firmly shut to him.”

  She handed him the envelope with his final check, opened the door to the hallway, and waited.

  Then waited some more.

  “This is when you go,” she prompted.

  He got up, all bravado and righteous anger gone, and escaped into the hall.

  “Fuck boys,” she
muttered. “The lot of them.”

  “Me, too?”

  Her heart skipped a beat when she turned and saw Kevin. He was grinning and so fucking gorgeous it took her breath away. Wide shoulders, slender hips, those gorgeous gray eyes, and an ass she could bounce a dime off of.

  Not that she’d looked.

  Fuck, who was she kidding? Of course she’d looked.

  “Dinner?” he asked, lips twitching.

  She didn’t bother answering. This particular exchange had been going on for the last two weeks anytime she was in her office at the arena. He’d seek her out with a “PR issue” or bump into her—which she thought was really him trying to pretend to not be seeking her out—and he’d always ask the same one-word question.

  Dinner?

  No, she couldn’t fucking go to dinner.

  He was young and successful and way too pretty to be a hockey player—not that she’d tell him that because the last thing he needed was a confidence boost or God forbid that she admit she was attracted to him and he found more ways to bump into her. But the point was that she was old, didn’t shit where she ate, and more than either of those things . . . she was broken.

  Inside, she was broken.

  So, no men.

  And definitely, no men who might mean something.

  But most especially no beautiful, lovely, nice men who were just beginning their upward climb. Men who had their whole lives in front of them. Men who didn’t need a woman to hold them back, but to lift them up and support them and give them a family.

  She couldn’t do that.

  And it hurt.

  Fuck, it hurt.

  Almost two decades since she’d found out that she couldn’t have babies, and while she’d locked that desire down, pushed away thoughts of carrying a life in her womb, of cradling a newborn in her arms, this man threatened that. She’d shoved her fantasies into a mental chest, chained it closed, slapped a dozen locks on it, then had thrown their keys in just as many directions.

  But two weeks of Kevin—hell, she was pathetic enough to remember each of the twelve times he’d asked her out to dinner—and the chains on that chest were weakening.

  Rather than being happy and fulfilled with her career, with her exorbitant hourly rate to keep her company instead of a husband and baby, she was acutely aware all over again of what she would never have. With just twelve one-word questions and a few sharp—on her end—and teasing—on his—conversations, everything was coming apart at the seams.

  This man was dangerous to her mental well-being.

  She barely knew him and yet . . . he made her feel. Worse, he made her want.

  She couldn’t want.

  She couldn’t.

  “No to dinner.”

  Her first mistake was her tone. It revealed too damned much. Her second was not pushing Kevin away when he touched her. But his fingers on her jaw felt good, his calloused skin brushing along her throat, making her shiver. That, paired with his gentle question, was her undoing.

  “You okay?”

  Oh fuck.

  Her eyes filled with tears and she spun away, darting into her office before they escaped, slamming the door in his face so he wouldn’t see. Unfortunately, he caught the panel before she could close it completely then slipped inside, took one look at her face, and shut it behind him.

  Then he reached for her.

  And she let him.

  Fuck, but she let him.

  It was fucking incredible.

  Strong arms wrapped tightly around her, and Rebecca found herself with a nose full of Kevin’s spicy scent, her cheek pressed flat to his hard chest, words of comfort rumbling through the wide expanse to reach her ears.

  Not that she could decipher them.

  Because she was crying, sobbing like an absolute idiot and unable to stop, and she hadn’t cried in going on ten years, not since her parents had passed and she’d lost the last bit of softness in her soul.

  Her parents were what brought her out of herself.

  She shoved hard at Kevin’s chest, throat tightening all over again when it seemed like he wouldn’t let her go. But then he did and she stepped back, trying to ignore the smear of makeup and red lipstick on the soft gray of his T-shirt, which she was also trying to ignore was almost the exact same shade as his eyes.

  Eyes she couldn’t face.

  “Baby—”

  She spun away, walking around her desk to begin digging through the drawers for her emergency makeup kit. Based on the amount of product on his shirt, she’d need the full shebang. Ignoring the two-hundred-and-twenty-pound elephant in the room, along with the fact that she’d just used the word shebang, Rebecca located her case and sat down at her desk to fix her face.

  Her mask. Her shield from the world.

  Whatever.

  “Sweetheart—”

  “I’m on my period,” she blurted and then did her level best to not look at him when the only thing that greeted her in response was absolute silence.

  Her best wasn’t good enough because her eyes drifted up . . . and collided with storm clouds.

  Kevin raised a brow.

  Her gaze darted back to her makeup. Wipes, primer, foundation, mascara, liner, eye shadow, lipstick, eyebrow pencil. She lined them all up precisely on her desk.

  “I’ll buy you a new shirt,” she muttered, “but I’d appreciate you don’t tell the guys about this.”

  More silence. Then footsteps. “Don’t tell the guys you’re not actually superhuman?” A beat. “Contrary to what you might think, they already know that.” He plunked into the chair her pathetic intern Colby had just vacated. “You shouldn’t have brought us brownies, Killer.”

  She lifted a brow, even though it was only partially redrawn in, and despite herself, her lips twitched. “Killer?”

  “The team knows you well,” was all he said.

  Killer. She snorted, not admitting to the fact aloud, even though she tucked that gem close to her heart. Was it seriously fucked up that she loved they’d given her a nickname and that it was something like Killer? “I protect what’s mine.”

  One half of his mouth curved up. “Yeah, we know.”

  “And we bow to the goddess under pain of brownies,” he teased.

  “You mean under pain of not getting them,” she said then sighed. “I know what you’re doing.”

  His brow rose.

  “I know you’re not talking about brownies.”

  He sprawled in the chair, legs spreading, back hitting the cushions, confidence exuding from every pore. “I know you’re not on your period.”

  She’d had a sentence on the tip of her tongue, but his reply had that poofing off into a cloud of smoke. Most men ran at the first mention of menstruation, didn’t bring it up again. “Oh?” she asked in a dangerous tone as she fixed her liner. “How do you figure?”

  Kevin leaned forward to rest his elbows on her desk. “Because you had your period two weeks ago.”

  Rebecca froze, liner an inch from her eye, and slowly glanced up from the pocket-sized mirror on her desk to meet his gaze. Then she showed her hand. She knew she shouldn’t have, but she was too taken aback because . . . how could he possibly know that?

  “You always bring brownies when you’re on your period.”

  Her mouth dropped open.

  How. In. The. Fuck. Could. He. Know. That?

  How did he know that she always made a triple batch of double chocolate chip brownies on the first day of her period because cramps and losing one’s uterine lining necessitated having copious amounts of chocolate at hand . . . but also that she always brought the majority of the brownies to the rink because if she actually ate three batches, she would never fit into her clothes.

  And she fucking loved her clothes.

  Hence that exorbitant hourly rate.

  “So,” he said when she forced herself to keep going with her makeup. “Not hormones, but still upset. Do I need to go and destroy that little . . . fuck boy? Was that what you
called him?”

  “Yes,” she said. “That was what he was, and no. I took care of him already, no assault charges necessary.”

  “Damn,” he said. “Taking away my fun.”

  “Well, your fun would involve me pulling overtime in order to spin it, so I’d rather you didn’t.”

  “Fine.” He rapped his knuckles on the edge of her desk. “But only if you go out to dinner with me.”

  She swept on some eye shadow then proceeded with her lipstick, ignoring him.

  “You know,” he murmured. “Watching you put on your makeup may be the sexiest thing I’ve ever seen.” He stood, moved around the desk then dropped to his haunches, turning her chair to place and caging her in. Rebecca’s breath caught, and he noticed. He knew she was attracted to him.

  Dangerous.

  This man was so fucking dangerous.

  “I need makeup to cover up my wrinkles.”

  A blurt, a horrible one that was made strictly out of desperation, but Kevin’s reaction wasn’t anything she could have ever anticipated.

  He grinned and swept a finger across her cheekbone. “Well, I happen to like my women with a few lines.”

  She gasped, outraged, and slapped his hand away. “Y-you—”

  He broke into peals of laughter, huge guffaws that washed over her and soon had her lips tugging upward. Then she was laughing, too, enjoying the lightness after her dark thoughts of ten minutes before.

  Yes, sharing a moment of amusement with this man wasn’t horrible.

  Their laughter faded, and he patted her knee and stood. “I’ll pick you up for dinner after practice. Six thirty work for you?”

  “I didn’t agree to dinner,” she said, heart skipping a beat as he swaggered toward the door.

  “I also didn’t agree to not tell the boys you’ve been making us period brownies all this time.”

  She narrowed her eyes, gritted out, “You wouldn’t.”

  He grinned, hand on the doorknob. “I’m also going to go discreetly change my shirt and not answer any questions about whose makeup is smeared across my chest.”

  “Kevin—”

  “Italian good?” He paused on the threshold, waited.